Expert College Football Model Provides Analysis on LSU Football's Season Outlook

What are the chances Brian Kelly and the LSU Tigers clinch a College Football Playoff spot?

Courtesy of LSU Football.

No. 16 LSU (6-2, 3-1) returned to the practice fields on Tuesday afternoon with the program beginning game preparation for the Alabama Crimson Tide.

The Tigers will have an open date this weekend in order to recover while also staying in the film room to get a jumpstart on the Nov. 9 SEC showdown against Kalen DeBoer and Co.

For LSU signal-caller Garrett Nussmeier and the Bayou Bengals, last weekend's battle in College Station quickly became on the program will want to forget about, but not all hope is lost.

With the Tigers now sitting at 6-2 on the season with losses to Southern Cal and Texas A&M, what are the program's chances of making the College Football Playoff?

We went to the ESPN Football Power Index to see what the model had to say along with the thoughts of a few analysts:

The ESPN Football Power Index's Perspective:

ESPN's Football Power Index: LSU has a 21.2 percent chance to make the 12-team College Football Playoff and a 4.3 percent chance to win the SEC Championship.

LSU will take it week-by-week, but it's simple: The Bayou Bengals must win out to keep their postseason goals alive with matchups against Alabama, Florida, Vanderbilt and Oklahoma left on the 2024 schedule.

ESPN's FPI provided early predictions on the remaining schedule for the Tigers.

LSU will have a 32 percent chance to beat the Crimson Tide on Nov. 9, a 59 percent chance against the Gators and a 75 percent against the Sooners with the Tigers also predicted to come out on top against Vanderbilt.

That being said, LSU is favored in three out of the last four games of the season with only one game as underdogs against the Alabama Crimson Tide.

The Analysts Perspective:

SEC Network's Peter Burns took to social media last weekend with his sights set on the battle after posting: "Alabama at LSU on November 9th will now be a CFB Playoff elimination game."

Alabama at LSU on November 9th will now be a CFB Playoff elimination game.

— Peter Burns (@PeterBurnsESPN) October 27, 2024

Now, Paul Finebaum has chimed in on the SEC battle in Baton Rouge that is just 10 days away from kicking off in Tiger Stadium.

The SEC Network analyst has already dubbed the Southeastern Conference contest as a “playoff eliminator.”

“What (Alabama) got out of the (Missouri) game more than anything else is just some confidence into the bye week as they get ready for yet another playoff eliminator," Finebaum said on the Matt Barrie Show.

“We saw one [Saturday] with Missouri and the LSU-Alabama game … it may not be the marquee game of 2 weeks from now because there’s another game that’s more important in terms of drama, but it’s the first playoff eliminator game we’ve had.”

Finebaum dove into how high he had been on the LSU Tigers heading into the matchup, but after a catastrophic collapse in College Station, his prediction is shifting towards the Crimson Tide.

“I was so high on them against Alabama, but now I feel the wind shifting back to Alabama right now,” he said.

Now, as LSU gears up for a "College Football Playoff Elimination Game" in Death Valley, they will have no room for error.

Heading into game preparation against the Crimson Tide, LSU will focus on developing a consistent defensive game plan for dual-threat quarterback Jalen Milroe while sharpening both the offense and special teams unit.

“We need to be really good at a few things, and that’s what we do, and let’s get really good at it. We’ve got the bye week. We’ll clean some things up. We’ve got a good football team. Tonight was a bad half of football for us. And we’ll go back to work on ourselves, and we’ll get ourselves ready to play better football," Kelly said after the loss at Texas A&M.

LSU will have a bye week this Saturday before returning to Tiger Stadium on Nov. 9 to host No. 14 Alabama.

The Game Information: LSU Tigers vs. Alabama Crimson Tide

• Time: 7:30 PM ET
• Date: Saturday, Nov. 9
• Venue: Tiger Stadium
• TV Channel: ABC Network

More LSU News:

Instant Takeaways: No. 8 LSU Falls to No. 14 Texas A&M in College Station

LSU Dishes Out Offer to No. 1 Quarterback in America

Nick Saban Calls LSU Quarterback Garrett Nussmeier a "Sleeper" Ahead of 2024 Season

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